Colorado couple gets wedding ring back that was lost years ago

EVERGREEN, Colo. — It’s a reunion that reunited a Colorado couple with a beloved piece of jewelry that was stuck in a bathroom drain for several years.

Luckily the ring surfaced when it did because the Chicago home is up for sale again, meaning the next owners wouldn’t have had a way to track down the Evergreen couple.

Looking through a wedding album, Randy and Louise Heern took a stroll down memory lane. “My best man caught the garter,” Randy said.

In July, the couple will celebrate their 4oth wedding anniversary. But, just as they have the last six years, they were preparing to once again celebrate without a sacred token.

Louise’s wedding ring went missing after a Christening in 2007. She said, “I was heartsick, I really was. I mean we tore the house apart.”

Their house was under construction at the time and she says she thought the ring might have just been swept up with the broken tiles. But then, a phone call came. Randy explained the caller said, “We bought your house in Chicago and I think I found something that might belong to you.”

Turns out, the freezing temperatures busted a pipe in the master bedroom. “He said it just popped out,” Randy said about the caller.

Louise said, “So the subzero temperatures, the timing on that was really nice.”

The Heern’s can’t exactly say how the ring ended up in the drain, but they have an idea. Their 11-year-old cat, Axle might be the culprit.

“In that particular vanity, there was a lot of counter-top around that sink, so, it had to have been … it was something to play with,” Louise said. “The cats were probably up there batting it around and it probably fell in,” Randy added.

“I keep checking that it’s there. You know, after you lose something, you get a little paranoid,” said Louise as she touched the ring on her finger.

That doesn’t mean it’s always on her finger, but now she has a special place to keep it when it’s not. Randy explained, “When she takes it off, she puts it in her ring box now.”

“I think I’ll just keep it on. It’s less trouble,” Louise added.

Randy is no stranger to lost rings. Just this week he thought he lost his wedding band, but later found it in his pants pocket.